Parenting Chat Thread #3 (married, husband, college, friends)

[Zimbochick]

Originally Posted by cokatie

Hey Folks - sorry if this is the wrong place to ask, but what happened to Mattie's thread? Was it moved to another forum? Thanks!

It's on hiatus for a little while. Someone was being disrespectful.

[Zimbochick]

Ewag - we have quite a few Fillies here, I'm sure they can help. I hear you on "that Swedish" store, I think we have finally outgrown it too. I will say though that we bought some really nice living room and dining room furniture a few years ago, and it is pretty much trashed. Darned kids!

[DewDropInn]

Originally Posted by eastwesteastagain

So speaking of fun furniture, where do grown ups go to buy furniture??

I've bought in all kinds of stores. I've bought furniture on vacation! Yes. And had it shipped. I am insane. My idea of absolute heaven is walking into an antique store with fabulous old pieces that some Grandma loved. And hand waxed once a week.

But we bought our couch from The Room Store. Boy, that was boring.

[Zimbochick]

Dew - we buy furniture on vacation too. We have stuff from all over the world, and it's surprisingly cheap to ship. It's a much better fit for us than the traditional furniture stores.

[calgirlinnc]

Originally Posted by eastwesteastagain

So speaking of fun furniture, where do grown ups go to buy furniture??

We have recently moved back to N.C. and I am about 30 minutes away from "the furniture capital of the world".

Not only do we have the showrooms where you can look at zillions of pieces and order anything you want by any manufacturer you can think of, at below regular retail price....

We also have the OUTLETS as in, real FACTORY OUTLETS and not phony baloney pretend "outlets".

Did some shopping a few weeks ago. I found name brand counter stools for $25 each and they are adorable.

I posted in the decorating forum about a chair I got because I am trying to figure out the ottoman. The chair retails for $1000 and I got it for below wholesale (as in 70% off). And it's not even ugly! Needless to say, if I order the ottoman it will cost more than the chair.

Some of the outlets have left over, out of date, ugly stuff, but they also have some real gems that are there because the customer changed their mind, or it was a showroom sample, or it was the last run of fabric, etc.

For those of you within a reasonable distance of central N.C., it is worth a trip here (the shipping will kill ya, though).

The outlets range from Broyhill to Baker, Mitchell Gold and Bob Williams, Hooker, Henredon, Thomasville, etc.

[calgirlinnc]

And speaking of the Swedish store, there is one in the large city south of us. And I am amazed that people will go there to buy a sofa or a table when they could drive an extra hour and get a sofa that is 8 way hand tied and a table that is real wood and made in America (for the same price).

[DewDropInn]

I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one Zimbo! Chests from Taiwan. We lugged a chair home from Amish country in the back of a station wagon. Bookcases from Ireland. I must have inherited my penchant. One time when my dad took us to the county fair he went into an exhibition building and came out with a roll-top desk. (Which I have today.)

My grandmother collected unusual dishes. One summer while I was visiting she said, "take whatever you want" and I spent the rest of the summer sorting through stuff in her basement. I carried a suitcase full of china through O'Hare Airport. This is before luggage on wheels. After that I got smart and started shipping my treasures. (Except for the toilet paper dispenser shaped like a Swiss chalet that plays "Oh What a Beautiful Morning". I carried that in my backpack through 5 European countries.)

[jkcoop]

ewag - just go look around at furniture stores near you to see what there is. We are pretty lucky that we have American Furniture Warehouse here. In fact, there is one 15 minutes from us. Almost overwhelming it's so huge. We went to some other places and look at comparable furniture and almost had a coronary.

We've gotten a lot done today - but I feel horrible for my son. He went to put up the blinds - did a great job. But when he went to do whatever you do to shorten them and take slats out.....he cut the wrong cord.

He's trying to restring them now.

[Zimbochick]

Originally Posted by DewDropInn

(Except for the toilet paper dispenser shaped like a Swiss chalet that plays "Oh What a Beautiful Morning". I carried that in my backpack through 5 European countries.)

[DewDropInn]

Zimbo, that was the trip I met DH on! Yes. I can look at a toilet paper dispenser and remember seeing him for the first time.

(Thankfully I wasn't actually buying this gem when we met.)